COUNTY'S REFUSAL TO FINANCE RABIES CONTROL RAISES CONCERN CONTROL OFFICERS FEAR IMPLICATIONS FOR PUBLIC SAFETY

Ken Pellitteri knows firsthand how easy it is to get deathly ill from an animal bite.

Two years ago, on a routine call, the county animal control officer parted some hedges near PGA National, got bit by a wild cat and was out of work for a month.

"I had a 105-degree temperature for days," Pellitteri said of his brush with cat scratch fever. "The lymph glands in my neck and stomach swelled up. It was unbelievable."

Since Palm Beach County commissioners on Tuesday decided not to spend $71,546 to fully finance the county's rabies control program, Pellitteri and other animal control officers have spent a lot of time thinking about dangerous animals they have encountered and wondering how they can do their jobs adequately with less help.

"I keep thinking about these two Rottweilers that were running loose in Boynton Beach," Pellitteri said. "They were biting all sorts of people. No one could catch them until we did an investigation."

"We should show (commissioners) pictures of what a person looks like after getting attacked by a vicious dog," said Mike Lee, another officer. "What we need is one good vicious dog bite. That's when it will really hit the fan. People are going to flip out."

While the state program commissioners refused to help finance is directed at rabies control, the cutback will have ripple effects throughout the $2.5 million-a-year department that is soon to move into a new $3.4 million facility at Belevedere Road and Florida's Turnpike, officers said.

"It's so integrated that pulling out one piece could almost collapse the whole deck of cards," said Paul Milelli, director of the county's Department of Public Safety.

While no final decisions will be made until Animal Control Director Dennis Moore returns from vacation on Monday, Milelli said it is likely the cut will force the agency to lay off three of its 17 officers.

The loss of officers will reduce the agency's ability to respond to the 35,000-plus complaints it receives annually. After working hard to establish programs to control rabies and identify dangerous and vicious dogs, the department may be forced to retrench, Milelli said.

Instead of focusing on preventative health and safety issues, it may be forced to return to the days when animal control meant catching, sheltering and selling strays. Officers, in essence, would become dog catchers, he said.

In addition, those who get bit by animals that don't have rabies vaccinations or can't be found may be forced to get rabies shots because it may no longer be feasible to quarantine animals.

Rather than take the risk that an animal was not rabid, people would be advised to get the series of five rabies shots.

Last year, roughly half of the 2,377 animals which bit people were vaccinated so they did not have to be quarantined. Another 951 had to be quarantined because there was no proof they had their shots. Another 107 animals died after biting someone, so rabies tests were done. None tested positive.

Although in the last 10 years only two animals have tested positive for rabies, it would be foolish not to get shots if there were questions about whether an animal was infected, officials said.

"If you're a mother of a young child it presents a great deal of controversy," he said. "Going to the doctor with your 4- or 5-year-old to get shots is a very traumatic and hysterical thing."

Although he is Moore's boss, Milelli said this week has been an education in exactly what animal control does.

"It's all interrelated," he said of conversations he's had with Moore on the phone.

For instance, the rabies control program is an integral part of the county's two-year-old vicious and dangerous dog identification program.

If dog bite reports show that a particular dog is a menace, its owners are ordered to secure the animal or it will be destroyed. In doing so, officers hope to reduce the likelihood that a person will be seriously injured in an attack.

If the dog bite program is gutted because of the funding cut, it may not be possible to continue the dangerous and vicious dog program, Milelli said.

Since the program was established in May 1989, 37 dogs have been classified as potentially dangerous, 15 have been classified as dangerous and one has been classified as vicious.

Michele Kunter, who called animal control this week about dogs that roam her Lantana neighborhood, was disgusted by the commission's action.

Kunter said her neighborhood is overrun with large dogs that people buy to protect them but don't control.

"I wouldn't walk my child to school, not with the dogs in this neighborhood," she said.

Jamie Illicete, the officer who answered the call, said Kunter's neighborhood is not unique.

"There are dogs running loose all over the county," she said.

To Illicete, the effect of the funding cut is clear: "There will be more dangerous dogs on the street."

Signe Page, animal bite coordinator, said she understands the commission's reluctance to begin paying for the program that has been financed by the state. Like commissioners, she suspects that once the county begins helping it, state money will disappear. But, she said, one way or another local people will pay.

"Maybe they didn't understand what they were doing," she said. "We have a good program. It would be a shame to lose it."